CULLMAN – Back in May, we begin weekly installments examining addictions and their impact on the lives of people in our community. This week, in part eight, we wrap up the series.
Which drug addiction is being discussed in the following quote?
“Gradually things got worse. I had tried everything including church, medicine, meetings and jail to stop. I lost everything worthwhile in life. Relationships, jobs, a child, a family, my home (I became homeless), my freedom, and most importantly, myself. I could not understand how it could happen. I about killed my parents. I broke their hearts and almost worried them to death. They didn't understand either. I started ending up in jails, detoxes and treatment centers. I had every reason to stop and could not. I began to hate myself and my life. I was dying a slow tormenting death and believed that is how it was gonna be.”
What about this one? Alcohol? Meth?
“I was still seeing my girls in the beginning. I didn’t think they knew I was even using. Then, it got to the point when I didn’t even go see them and I wouldn’t let them come to my house because I didn’t want them to be around it. It was like I quit caring. I hated who I was.”
Here’s an addict whose abuses food.
“I like fruits and vegetables, but I never eat them because junk food like pizza tastes better. I know it’s short-sighted, but it’s easier just to be fat. I know that sounds bad, but when you boil it down, that’s the truth. I wish it wasn’t. I don’t want to die because I’m too lazy to cook and eat something healthy, but that’s where I’m headed.”
Which addiction is the addict in this quote suffering from? Opiates?
“I was sent by ambulance to the emergency room, where I had a stroke and a lot of seizures during my 14-day hospital stay. I flat lined twice while I was there. I died twice. I recall none of it. Near the end of my hospital stay I decided that I needed to go back to treatment, but nowhere would take me because I was a liability. I was very weak on my left side, couldn’t stop drooling and was on a walker.”
Alcohol, meth, food, opiates? What’s the drug of choice with this addict?
“I knew I was at a point where I couldn’t go on. I had no place of my own and was sleeping on the couch at a longtime friend’s house who was using too. My body was dying, my mind was dying, I was miserable any time I was awake.”
Why are we prone to judge an opiate or methamphetamine addict more harshly than an alcoholic or food addict? Are meth addicts more prone to violence than an alcoholic? Is the annual cost of treating opiate addiction more than treating food addiction?
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 28 people are killed every day in the United States in vehicle accidents involving a driver who has been drinking. More than one person every hour dies on the roads because of alcohol, costing more than $44 billion each year.
Mind you, that’s only the deaths in motor vehicle accidents. Those numbers do not account for deaths from alcohol poisoning, liver disease, heart disease and myriad other diseases and accidents. The CDC also estimates that 1 in 10 women drink while pregnant, despite the devastating consequences of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Disorders, which is why no alcohol is recommended during prenatal and natal months.
Why does society, as a whole, view addictions differently from one another when the symptoms and outcomes are the same? Why is the sufferer of the disease of addiction judged differently than the sufferer of the disease of cancer?
Both are primary diseases and aren’t a result of another condition and both get worse without treatment. Neither are cured, but both can be put into remission. Left untreated, both diseases will kill the sufferer.
Those are the realities of any disease – cancer, diabetes, epilepsy, addiction, Alzheimer’s, bronchitis, rheumatoid arthritis or another.
Part 1: http://cullmansense.com/articles/2016/05/22/addiction-family-affair-part-1
Part 2: http://cullmansense.com/articles/2016/05/29/addiction-game-changer-part-2
Part 3: http://cullmansense.com/articles/2016/06/05/addiction-luckiest-guy-i-know-part-3
Part 4: http://cullmansense.com/articles/2016/06/11/addiction-christ-centered-recovery-part-4
Part 5: http://cullmansense.com/articles/2016/06/25/addiction-food-part-5
Part 6: http://www.cullmansense.com/articles/2016/07/02/addiction-alcoholism-and-consequences-being-life-party-part-6
Part 7: http://www.cullmansense.com/articles/2016/07/17/addiction-meth-part-7
